“How did you get it?” said the patroon, thoughtfully.
“My master left the keys on the dresser.”
“And if he misses this letter––”
“Oh, Monsieur, I grieve my master is so ill he could not miss anything but his ailments! Those he would willingly dispense with. My poor master!”
“There! Take your long, hypocritical face out of my sight!” said Mauville, curtly, at the same time handing him the promised reward, which François calmly accepted. A moment later, however, he drew himself up.
“Monsieur has not paid for the right to libel my character,” he said.
“Your character!”
“My character, Monsieur!” the valet replied firmly, and bowed in the stateliest fashion of the old school as he backed out of the room with grand obsequiousness. Deliberately, heavily and solidly, resounded the echoing footsteps of François upon the stairway, like the going of some substantial personage of unimpeachable rectitude.
As the front door closed sharply the land baron threw the envelope on the table and quietly surveyed it, the remnants of his pride rising in revolt.